Back from Bodyshop! Door Assembly Time..!
Those keeping an eye on my progress will have noted the lack of update last weekend.. it was pretty much my first weekend off since the rebuild started, and with good reason: I had no car!
The lil Arosa has spent a week at the bodyshop, getting arches rolled, doors painted and as they have basically resprayed both sides of the car front to back; filled a few dents thanks to last years recovery.
This morning, I collected the lil beastie, and things are looking great now the car's back to being just 2 colours!
As they have sprayed both sides in their entirety, the black bonding agent is no-more, and when you open the rear pop-outs things look like they were factory fitted:
Also, the interior of the doors look mighty spiffing in new, shiny, silver paint:
Additionally, my arch-rubbing fears with the new wheels and tyres are now over. Here's a pic of first the front, and then the rear wheel arches (taken with standard wheels fitted):
Enough picture taking, I started work. The doors were now ready for re-assembly using the cards, switches and fixings taken from my previous heavy-weight doors. I had to fit the ratchet-arms, wiring, electric mirrors and looms and finally the upper and lower door cards. I did the drivers door first:
Once I had confirmed all electrics were working (I had never tested the windows/locking on the 'new' aluminium doors), I assembled the passenger door:
With everything working, I turned my attention to re-fitting the new wheels, applying a second coat of underseal in the rear arches whilst the wheels were off the car. Then I applied some aluminium tape around the oil filter, in an attempt to reflect some of the manifold heat that caused the last filter to weld itself on! The final task of the day was to cut out some more room for the power feeds into and out of my battery isolation switch and apply a rubber gromit to ensure that no shorts to ground could develop - that would be very nasty.